UPDATE 3-Talks on Internet treaty fail as U.S. bloc won't sign

DUBAI/SAN FRANCISCO Dec 13 (Reuters) - An attempt by
national governments to establish a worldwide policy for
oversight of the Internet collapsed on Thursday after many
Western countries said a compromise plan gave too much power to
United Nations and other officials.

Delegates from the United States, UK, Australia and other
countries took the floor on the next to last day of a UN
conference in Dubai to reject revisions to a treaty governing
international phone calls and data traffic.

"It's with a heavy heart and a sense of missed opportunities
that the U.S. must communicate that it's not able to sign the
agreement in the current form," said Terry Kramer, the U.S.
ambassador to the gathering of the UN's International
Telecommunication Union.

While other countries will sign the treaty on Friday, the
absence of so many of the largest economies means that the
document, already watered down to suit much of the West, will
have little practical force. "It will bring some legal concerns
between countries that have and haven't signed the treaty," said
a South American delegate who declined to be identified.

Though technologists who had raised alarms about the
proceedings preferred no deal to one that would have legitimized
more government censorship and surveillance, the failure to
reach an accord could increase the chance that the Internet will
work very differently in different regions.

"Maybe in the future we could come to a fragmented
Internet," delegate Andrey Mukhanov, a top international
official at Russia's Ministry of Telecom and Mass
Communications, told Reuters. "That would be negative for all,
and I hope our American, European colleagues come to a
constructive position."

Delegates from the United States and other holdout countries
said they would continue to press at other international
gatherings in support of what they call a "multi-stakeholder
model," in which private industry groups set standards and play
a large role in the development of the medium.
Continued...